Tag: hygiene

Childhood diarrhoeal illness may be underestimated in national health surveys

Katie Overbey, Kellogg Schwab and Natalie Exum

For children in low-income countries, diarrhoea remains a major cause of death and can lead to long-term health consequences. Accurate estimates of childhood diarrhoeal illness are crucial to evaluating the success of campaigns to defeat diarrhoea and improve health in countries where the burden of diarrhoea is high.

In our study, recently published in the IJE, we found that caregivers may underestimate diarrhoeal diseases in children aged under 5 years when asked to recall whether the children had diarrhoea in the previous 2 weeks. Compared with a 1-week recall period, there was a consistent underestimation of the prevalence of diarrhoea across five countries in sub-Saharan Africa.

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Hygiene gaps: between access and practice, and from region to region

Jennyfer Wolf, Richard Johnston, Matthew C Freeman and Annette Prüss-Ustün

Handwashing with soap after faecal contact is key to preventing disease and death from enteric infectious diseases. Our study, recently published in the IJE, is the first to provide global, regional and country estimates of handwashing with soap after potential contact with human faeces, based on representative data on access to handwashing facilities collected for monitoring of the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). Our results show that handwashing with soap after using the toilet or other potential contact with human faeces is poorly practised worldwide and that even the necessary equipment – handwashing facilities with soap and water – are inaccessible to billions of people.

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